Privacy notice
Last updated: October 23, 2026
This notice explains what we collect when you use 4D Sourcing, why, who sees it, and how long we keep it.
Who we are. 4D Sourcing is operated by 4D Sourcing Inc., a company registered in Delaware, United States, at 58 Marta Dr, Wilmington, DE 19808. Contact: info@4dsourcing.com.
What we collect and why
| What | Why |
|---|---|
| Your account details: name and email address | To create your account and contact you |
| About you: job title, company name, country, and, if you choose to give them, a phone or WhatsApp number, a LinkedIn profile and how you heard about us | To know who we are working with, to reach you quickly during research, and to give the free factory checks once per company |
| About your company: website, what kind of company it is, the industries you sell into, the products you plan to buy, roughly how much you buy from China, how many Chinese suppliers you work with, the documents your customers require, and, if you choose, what is hardest | To focus our research on what matters to you, and to check that the company is genuine before we add a free factory check |
| Your company's registration document, if we ask you for one | To check that the company is registered |
| Documents you upload, such as a specification sheet, a quote or price list, a certificate of analysis or technical data sheet | To research for you and, with all names removed, for our price and quality benchmarks |
| Your requests, messages and files sent through your account | To carry out the research you ask for and reply to you |
| If you order: the name and email address on your invoice, what you ordered, the amount, and whether it was paid | To invoice you, record your payment and keep the accounts the law requires |
| The products you follow on our price pages | To send you the monthly price emails you asked for |
| Server logs: technical records of requests to our servers, such as the IP address, the page and the time | To keep the site secure and working |
Cookies and your browser
Our site runs on WordPress. It uses only the cookies WordPress needs for signing in:
| Cookie | When it is set | What it does | How long it lasts |
|---|---|---|---|
wordpress_test_cookie | When you open a sign-in or password page | Checks that your browser accepts cookies | Until you close your browser |
wp-resetpass-… | When you open the link to set or reset your password | Holds that link's key while you choose a password | Until you set the password or close your browser |
wordpress_logged_in_… and wordpress_sec_… | When you sign in | Keep you signed in | Until you close your browser (at most 2 days), or 14 days if you tick "Keep me signed in" |
- Our pages come straight from our server, not through an outside network service, so no other cookies are added on the way.
- Your choice of light or dark display is stored in your own browser (local storage), not in a cookie, and is not sent to us.
- We do not use advertising, analytics or tracking cookies.
How we check your details
Before we add a free factory check, we check that the details in About you and About your company look genuine: for example, that the company name, email address and website fit together, and that the answers are not placeholders.
Some of these checks are done for us by a service provider in the United States. It sees only company details: the company name, the part of your email address after the @, the website, the country, what kind of company it is, the industries you sell into and the products you plan to buy. It does not see your name, phone number, LinkedIn profile or full email address.
A decision not to add a free check is made only by fixed rules or by our team, never by that service alone. If a check isn't added, you can write to info@4dsourcing.com.
When you upload a registration document, an automatic check reads it and compares it with the details you entered: whether it is a company registration document, whether it is readable, and whether the company name matches. Whether your account is approved follows fixed rules, not an open judgement. If the automatic check does not approve your account, it tells you why; you can upload a clearer copy or ask our team for a second look.
Monthly price emails
When you follow a product on one of our price pages, we email you its price direction once a month, on the day that month's prices are published. All the products you follow come in one email. If you are a customer, the email also shows the quotes you can see on the price pages.
Following a product is how you ask for these emails. There is no separate box to tick when you sign up.
You can stop these emails at any time: use the unsubscribe link in any of them, or turn them off under Emails in My account. You can also unfollow products there. Emails about your account and your requests are always sent.
Paying for an order
If you order paid work, we send you an invoice through Stripe, our payment service. To make the invoice, we give Stripe your name and email address, what you ordered and the amount. Stripe emails you the invoice with a link to its payment page, where you pay by card and can download the invoice and receipt. Your card details go straight to Stripe and do not pass through our servers. We do not see your full card number: we see only the card type, the last four digits, the expiry date and whether the payment went through.
Stripe receives what you enter on its payment page, such as your name, email address, billing address and card details, and technical information about your device and browser, such as your IP address. Stripe takes the payment for us. It also uses this information for its own purposes, such as preventing fraud and meeting its legal duties; for those purposes it decides how the information is used, under its own privacy policy: https://stripe.com/privacy. Stripe may process this information in the United States and in other countries where it or its service providers work, and keeps its own record of the payment under that policy.
Who sees your information
- Our team, to check accounts and do your research.
- Colleagues at your company. Each person at your company opens their own account. To give the About you and About your company checks only once per company, we compare company details across accounts, keeping only a coded marker for this. We never tell your colleagues that you registered, and they cannot see your requests.
- Service providers acting on our instructions only: an email service in the United States; the servers for our website and research engine in Tokyo, Japan; a document-reading service in the United States; a service in the United States that helps us check the details given when you sign up; and search and research services in the United States and China.
- Stripe, our payment service, when you order. It makes and sends your invoice and takes the payment for us, and also uses your payment details for its own purposes, such as preventing fraud, under its own privacy policy (see Paying for an order).
- We do not sell your information. We never share the files you upload with suppliers or with other buyers. Our benchmarks use numbers only, never your name, your company's name or the file.
Where your information is processed
Our website and research servers are in Tokyo, Japan. Some of the services listed above are in the United States and China, so your information may be processed in those countries. When you pay an invoice, Stripe may process your payment details in the United States and other countries.
How long we keep it
- Your account details, your About you and About your company answers, the files you upload, what you write in your requests and messages, and the products you follow: while your account is open, and deleted 30 days after the account is closed.
- The results of the checks on your details: while your account is open. 30 days after the account is closed we delete the answers they quote and keep only the result.
- A coded marker of your company, which can't be read back into its name: kept after the account is closed, so the once-per-company free checks are not given twice.
- Registrations that are never confirmed by email: deleted after 7 days.
- Server logs: 90 days.
- Benchmark figures: kept, but they contain no names and cannot be traced back to you or the file.
- Reports we have delivered, including the questions from your request that they quote: kept, also after the account is closed.
- If you order: your invoices and the record of your payments (the name and email address on the invoice, what you ordered, the amount and whether it was paid): for 7 years, also after the account is closed.
- Other records we must keep by law: for as long as the law requires.
- Backups: when we delete information, a copy of it can stay in our backups until those backups are deleted. We make a backup on our server in Tokyo before each update to the site and keep it for 30 days. We always keep the most recent one, even if it is older.
Your choices
You can ask us to show you, correct or delete the information we hold about you, or to close your account, by writing to info@4dsourcing.com.
Changes: if we change this notice, we will update the date above and tell account holders about material changes by email.